The galleries below show a selection of the riches of wildlife to be found in Selsdon Wood. Hover over each image for information or click to see an enlarged version. We would be delighted to add your photographs to the galleries - please send them to selsdonwood@gmail.com.

Amphibians & Reptiles

To date these are the only photos we have of amphibians from Selsdon Wood and there are no sightings of reptiles.

The frogspawn in the Jubilee pond (shown in the first photograph) never hatched in situ. By the time the little tadpoles were ready to emerge the spawn had collapsed and we assumed the stagnant water in the pond had killed it. Fortunately, we had removed a batch of spawn earlier to rear at home and the photos of the developing tadpoles below were taken from this. However, the high attrition rate was troubling and as deaths continued it appeared that the problem was virtually certain to be the ranavirus disease that has been killing frogs worldwide since about 1980. It also affects the developing tadpoles and the symptoms were all evident in these tadpoles, lethargy, loss of feeding, swollen abdomen and pigment changes. Apparently the water that infected frogs enter can become a home for the virus, reinfecting any later frogs and tadpoles, so there is not much hope for our still water pool. The disease also lethally infects all other amphibians and reptiles - which may explain why we have no other sightings. The froglet in the final photograph in the sequence was the only one remaining from the 80 tadpoles that we started with - and sadly it too died the following day.

Birds

An up-to-date listing of all the Birds seen in Sesldon Wood is provided below.

The list will be updated when new species are seen - additions could occur at any time, particular during migration.